"There place where Nick hangs his hat these days-or his baseball cap?- is a home fit for a segment on "Lifestyles of the rick and famous". On that series, Robin Leach took his television audience right up to the front door and inside the ritzy mansions of the biggest stars from Hollywood to Palm Beach. Our Florida place isn't quite a Beverly Hills compound, but if MTV ever decided to do a rock'n'roll version, "Lifestyles of the rock'n'famous", it would be a frontrunning candidate for the show. Fan magazines show pictures of our house. In one photo spread it was described as "fashionable digs," which clearly it is.
Our current home is the high point of our real estate history. Once, not terribly long ago, the only roof above Nick's head at times was the bright blue sky, and the main lighting fixture was the sun.
At the end of a tour or a recording session Nick now comes home to the house or our dreams. It's one of the rewards of yours of hard work and a proof that keeping your goals in sight can pay off.
Nick and his brother and sisters and us live in a small town outside of Tampa. Our house is at the end of a suburdan street, a dead end. A canal wraps around our property. To come into our home you drive through a tall black wrought-iron gate with an intercom.
Nick's rising popularity turned our home into a tourist attraction. One day recently when Nick was to arrive from a tour, we had about a hundred people outside with banners welcoming him back. Aside from that one particular home-coming event, we usually get about fifty fans a day for whom we always have autograph cards available. Nick wants them handed out as a token of his appreciation that a fan would take all the time and trouble to see his home.
When Nick is home he sometimes ambles out and personally says hi. When he or any of my other childrn go down to the mailbox, there's somebody with a video camera ready to tape.
Let me open the gate for you and take you up our circular brick driveway. Our home is a modern beige and brown version of a country-style design. Florida palms and tropical plants sway in the balmy breeze to greet you. In back there's a crooked palm tree that boaters can see as they glide along the canal.
Our living room is decorated like many of yours, with soft wall-to-wall carpetting and comfy couches. And yet it is unmistakably the home of a pop star. A collection of platinum from sales in countries all around the world fills the walls. These shimmering showcases of framed discs start at ground level and continue right up to our high ceiling. Everywhere one looks-on our coffee tables and bookcases-there are awards, accolades, and mememtos from many sources.
In between the gifts from people in the music business are presents from Nick's fans. They have places of honor in our living room. There are some spectacular photographs of Nick singing and wonderful, whimsical caricatures all sent to us by talented young fans. There isn't room to feature each and every gift, but we try to display as many as possible because they mean so much to Nick and to all of us in the Carter family.
Even celebrities like Nick stand in awe of some famous peers. Cindy Crawford autographed her photograph for Nick, signing "Happy Birthday." It's on a coffe table.
Nick and Aaron share a loft bedroom that Bob had a hand in building. Nick's the messier of the two, but now that Aaron is soon to be a teen, he's catching up fast. It think it's the age. When kids become teenagers, they seem to spend a little less time on neatening up their rooms. Nick's large bad is covered with a bedspread that's green - his favorite color.
Onstage singing and dancing, Nick gets bombarded with items, some of which find their way into his bedroom. Fans hurl teddy bears and a regular menagerie of stuffed cats, dogs, sharks, and Beanis Babies at Nick and the other Backstreet Boys. Nick plays catch, and coos with the flying furry friends. A sampling of his favorites, saved from these concerts, lines the floor just underneath a series of windows that run along one wall of his bedroom. He sees them every time he looks out his window at the serene view across the canal.
Nick had a huge walk-in closet with lots of hanging space and shelving. Hockey jerseys line up next to jeans and shorts. The top shelf boasts a collection of hats. There are baseball hats from teams coast to coast, and funny hats, too varied even to describe. Many of them have come from fans. Nick loves wearing them. There's a mess of cumputer game paraphernalia, PlayStation consoles and wiring, and some valuable collectibles. Over the years Nick played with baseball cards, as many young adolescents do, and there's quite a boxful. Basketball is Nick's favorite sport, and he has a prized basketball autographed by the athletes he admires.
Yes, even though Nick is a teen idol, he is also a real teenager. His bedroom holds all the evidence of an adolescent who still has a tiny toehold in childhood. When he comes home, he takes out everything, making a colossal chaos with stuff strewn all over the floor. You'd think a tornado set down.
Even with that charm and smile Nick can't weasel out of trouble all the time. Several months ago after Nick pulled one of his usual homecoming hurricane maneuvers, Bob told him he needed to clen up his room beacauce people were coming to visit. Nick didn't clean his room, so he got grounded! Did the superstar throw a super-protest? No. Actually, I think he was secretly pleased that we still pay attention to what he does and that he's regular member of the family. Nick is like any teenager, and I believe that teenagers thend to think you don't care if you never discipline them when it's called for.
Part of the decor of our home stems from Nick's fame; part of it honors the achievements of others. Some fans may be wallpapering their rooms with posters of Nick; Nick plasters his room with posters of Michael Jordan.
When Nick is home, we can often find him out back- when he's not messing up his room- in an outdoor "study" that his dad built along the dock. It looks like "this old house" meeting up with a hut from "Gilligan's island". It's a wooden enclosed room, with lattice walls, where the breeze blows in off the water. Our family loves sitting out there; it's where one of our family pets lives. A huge cage houses Baby Face, the iguana that Aaron loves to talk about. Our home has ample dock space for our boat. All of us, especially Nick, love to go out on the bay. We even have manatees swimming in our canal from time. We've posted a sign that warns please watch fro manatees because they're endangered creatures here in Florida.
Our backyard also has a small but lovely tiled inground swimming pool. I've planted roses and lime trees all around the backyard. Nick and I don't have much time to smell the roses and pungent limes is blowing in the winds right outside. Also blowing in that wind is the sound of Nick's sisters and Aaron jumping on our family trampoline. We brought the trampoline with us to this house; it has quite a history. Nick's neighborhood notoriety began with his trampoline shows.
A fan asked me recently during an on-lin chat, "Does Nick feel like he is missing out on the everyday things that he could be doing at home?" My answer was yes. Sure he does. Nick enjoys traveling, but loves to be home.
